En route to Victory Road

Button-bashing is fun and all, but in reality, game strategy is where it’s at. Whether you’re leading your team to victory in League of Legends, outmaneuvering opponents in Fortnite, or up against a particularly nasty raid boss in World of Warcraft or Final Fantasy, your success inevitably depends on the preparation and game plan you have put together beforehand.

Developing a winning strategy takes forethought, cunning, and careful planning. From obtaining that key loot you’ve wanted for so long, to climbing the precious League Elo ladder, it’s important to visualize the steps you will take on the path to victory, and what better way to visualize this than with draw.io!

In this blogpost, let draw.io be your trusty steed, speedrunning you to the Winners Circle. We’ll show how you can take your gaming strategy to the next level, and make your future gameplay better coordinated, more collaborative, and more efficient.

1. Hone your game plan with swimlane diagrams

Unlike Leeroy Jenkins, you probably don’t want to run into battle headfirst, with no plan on how to execute your strategy, or who will be responsible for what.

Swimlane diagrams are a great way to visualize complex strategies in a simple and organized manner. They’re ideal for mapping out rotations that involve multiple players or stages with different responsibilities. They enable you to plan ahead, and ensure everyone on your team is aligned and knows their role in the upcoming fight.

Use swimlanes to represent different players or roles in an MMORPG like World of Warcraft, and symbols to depict the actions and interactions between them.

A swimlane diagram for planning a WoW boss fight

2. Develop your game sense with Fatality flowcharts

Game sense is not as simple as “practice makes perfect”. While this will help your reaction time and increase the speed with which you make decisions, analyzing your previous games and comparing them with how others compete will take your gameplay to the next level. The deeper you develop your understanding of a game’s mechanics, along with your objectives, strategies, and interactions, the more you will increase your game sense.

draw.io empowers gamers to craft diagrams depicting potential flank routes, chokepoints, and optimal ultimate ability combinations. You can use visualizations to dissect replays, and highlight crucial instances where game sense played a pivotal role, from predicting enemy pathing to anticipating an opponent’s strategy.

A flowchart is ideal for illustrating the decision-making process and the sequence of actions. Use different shapes and colors to highlight certain actions, like movement or abilities. Connectors will guide those viewing the diagram through the steps that will signify the flow of gameplay. Things like decision splits, branches, and conditional actions can also be depicted in your flowchart.

A flowchart depicting the Overwatch fatality gameplay loop

3. Collaborate with your teammates on your strategy map

In games like WoW, FF Online, ESO, etc., teamwork is absolutely essential, and collaboration is everything. The more in-tune you and your teammates are, the better your chances of a coordinated effort resulting in success. That’s what gaming headsets were developed for in the first place, right? (Not to badmouth everyone because you’re sore your group wiped).

Create a strategy map in draw.io that you can quickly share with your raiding guild, for everyone to add their ideas to. You and your team are able to collaborate on your strategy in real time: simply jump on Discord, share your diagram with your group, and get visualizing! Everyone has the chance to capture their ideas, suggestions and comments, and see and interact with what their teammates are adding. This truly synergizing experience with your team means no one is left behind on your journey to success.

A multipage diagram here is perfect for this: on one page, you have your strategy map, on the next, you have your schedule and roster for your guild, all stored within one central diagram.

Page 1 of a multipage diagram depicting a strategy map: player vs. player battleground

Page 2 of a multipage diagram depicting the team roster

4. Use Foresight to create mind maps for community engagement

You might have recently begun your content creator journey and are starting to stream your games on Twitch. Or you might be a seasoned coach, providing tips to gamers on an international playing field to help them get good. In either case, fostering community engagement is often a pain point for gamers. You try and reach viewers, but your channel just isn’t growing.

Fear not! With draw.io, you can create stunning mind maps to provide your followers with valuable insights into your gaming tips and tricks. By actively and regularly sharing loadouts, strategies, game sense, spawns, etc. with your audience, you give them exclusive access and privileged insight that will allow them to learn from you, and from each other.

Not only will you inspire your viewers to use and share these resources themselves, you will ultimately cultivate community engagement and create an enriching gaming experience for everyone.

A mind map to come up with ways to boost community engagement

A Paradigm Shift in your game strategy

The four diagrams above are just a glimpse into the versatility of visualization that is possible with draw.io. From refining tournament strategies to fostering community engagement, draw.io offers a suite of tools and features to elevate your gameplay, along with a shift in your way of imagining, planning and executing your strategy.

Embark on your journey to glory, with draw.io by your side!

Want to dive deeper into the world of draw.io? Access our linktr.ee page to follow us on social media and learn how others use draw.io, as well as pick up some helpful tips and tricks.

Your one-stop shop for templates

You should already be familiar with building custom diagram templates in draw.io, but what about incorporating diagram templates within a Confluence page template or blueprint (very meta), to use time and time again?

This is particularly useful for things like holding brainstorming or retrospective meetings with your teams. Often, as time goes by, you develop a routine for these meetings, optimizing the process and storing the knowledge and resources gained to apply to future meetings. Confluence and draw.io are the perfect combo for you to record what’s going well in your brainstorming and retrospective formats, to access in future meetings at the click of a button.

Here’s how it’s done:

Note: You must have already created and saved your draw.io diagram templates and stored them in a Confluence page, before creating a Confluence page template. To find out how to do this, see Leverage your draw.io user experience with custom templates.

1. To start building your Confluence page template, head to the Settings icon at the top-right of the page, click Global Templates and Blueprints, then Add Global Template.

2. Add any relevant text to your Confluence page template. You might want to add a meeting agenda for example, or include some explanatory notes on how the retro process works.

3. Add your existing draw.io diagram template by typing /draw and select either draw.io Board or draw.io Diagram.

4. Use the search bar to locate the draw.io template you wish to use, then click Create.

5. Once you’ve added the diagram, it will be stored in the Confluence page template. When you are finished, click Save to save your changes.*

*In the template view, you will not see a preview of your diagram. However, when you create a new Confluence page and load the template you have created, the diagram will display as expected.

6. Once saved, your template will display in the list of Global Templates and Blueprints. It’s helpful at this stage to add a description about the template for others who may want to use it in future.

When you’re ready to use your template

When you’re ready to use your template:

1. Create a new Confluence page in your team space.

2. Locate the template page you wish to use. If it’s a template you have created, click on My Templates to bring up a list of the ones you own. If it’s been created by someone else, browse through the list, or use the search bar to locate a specific template.

Hover over a template, to preview its contents.

3. Once you click on the template you wish to use, the Confluence page template containing your diagram will be loaded and ready to use:

Tabula rasa

After you have filled in the diagram for your retro and published the page, the changes you’ve made to the diagram and the Confluence page are preserved only on that specific page. When you create a new page and load the same template again, a new version of the Confluence page and diagram are created. So, no need to worry about overwriting your previous retro meeting notes, or the original Confluence template itself!

Want to dive deeper into the world of draw.io? Access our linktr.ee page to follow us on social media and learn how others use draw.io, as well as pick up some helpful tips and tricks.

Introduction

This game design saga draws to a close, and it’s time to take a break, pause, reflect, and appreciate the tool that has been instrumental in this journey. draw.io. In this blog I celebrate the partnership with this versatile tool and how it’s been the guiding light in the game design process.

I know I sound like such a fanboy, and I really am, and I make no apologies for that, it opened many doors in new ways I can be creative, and I am sure it will do the same for you reader.

A Companion from the Start

From the initial stages of game conceptualization, draw.io proved to be my sketchbook/notepad. It allowed me to visually map out ideas, giving structure to our creative storm.

A basic word cloud idea template to start from and can be used for the main story and character creation, anything really.

1. Open Confluence.
2. Open draw.io (blank diagram).
3. Drag & drop your XML file into your blank drawing area.
4. Use it as a custom template if you like.

Crafting Characters and Stories

Delving into character creation and story weaving, draw.io proved to be the canvas. Our protagonist’s quirks, the supporting cast’s dynamics, and the overarching narrative, all took shape on this platform.

Templates of the character creations, each with different levels of detail, characters can be as detailed as the protagonist if you like.

1. Open Confluence.
2. Open draw.io (blank diagram).
3. Drag & drop your XML file into your blank drawing area.
4. Use it as a custom template if you like.

Mechanics, Dynamics, and Aesthetics

Game mechanics, dynamics, and aesthetics form the trifecta of game design. With draw.io, it visualized the dance between these elements, ensuring our game was engaging at every turn.

There are more elements and nuances that take place such as the look regarding the art and character appearances; in those instances I turn to other tools such as Blender, GiMP, Pixilart etc. These artistic elements are important but easier now that the core, bulk and direction of the game has been worked out. draw.io can co-ordinate these elements and give me a look at what the game will need.

A simplified beat sheet template, this will put things together like story and mechanics and help visualize the themes and aesthetics the game will need.

1. Open Confluence.
2. Open draw.io (blank diagram).
3. Drag & drop your XML file into your blank drawing area.
4. Use it as a custom template if you like.

Conclusion

Looking back, it’s evident how pivotal draw.io has been in the game design journey. As I embark on new adventures, with fresh ideas and challenges, I know one thing for sure: draw.io will remain my trusted ally. Here’s to more game design magic! (Alohomora!)

Thank you for taking the time to read this and I hope this has helped to inspire new methods of being creative and encouraging the imagination through this wonderful app.

draw.io Outro

We hope you’ve enjoyed Andy’s series! To look back on the rest of Andy’s storytelling in game design blogposts, see:

1. From Chaos to Clarity: Conceptualizing Your Short Game
2. Crafting Memorable Characters: From Chaos to Clarity
3. Refining Story Plots and Mechanics for Your Short Game
4. Game Design’s Chaos Compass: draw.io

If you want to find out what more draw.io can do for you and your teams to spark your creativity and assist with your storytelling journey, here are some resources, to get you started:

Blogposts

• Smart Templates, an exclusive new feature from draw.io
• Draw timelines and roadmaps in draw.io
• Work with text and connectors
• Whiteboarding for Ideation

Videos

• How to split connectors by inserting a shape in your draw.io diagrams

Introduction

The game concept has evolved and our characters have developed. Now it’s time to refine it into a polished gem.

We shift our focus on balancing gameplay, and this will be as simple as it can be to demonstrate the potential of the story and the gameplay in an easy format – this will help to see how much more can be explored when we have the basics set out first.

I plot out the game story plot structure using a 3 act structure used in most storytelling formats from books, film and gaming. (I developed this basic template through draw.io to help with setting out the story and mechanics).

Story Plot Development

Stories are the threads that bind our games together. In this phase, I take raw, chaotic story ideas and weave them into a structured plot.

draw.io will once again be my ally, helping me create a visual representation of our story’s progression. At the same time I will be learning new ways to develop story structures and plot development through draw.io as I navigate the narrative twists and turns.

Using tools like draw.io, I am able to visualize the narrative flow, pinpointing pivotal moments and ensuring that every twist and turn adds depth and excitement to the player’s journey.

I set out a basic plot line based on a timeline and separate them into the acts so I know when, where and what the player will be experiencing.

Based on this modified timeline is what helped shape the 3-act structure for the game. (The original timeline from a previous blog, I was experimenting with the idea of the player playing as the villain/minions in the story as well, but scrapped it as time became a factor).

As you will see, during refinement and process of realisation, there will be elements you will have to give up, sacrifice or set aside as a ‘stretch goal’ as we call it in the industry, where there will be ideas, concepts, mechanics, assets that on paper may be great but may cost too much time or resources to produce, so you set it aside for the future if the possibility arises to bring it into the game.

Mechanics Integration

I use a design framework called MDA (Mechanics, Dynamics, and Aesthetics) it helps balance key parts of developing a game; What a player can do, how they will do it and how it will feel, this is an oversimplification but it serves to see any design principle beyond just one focus of that game (for me it would be narrative (the Aesthetics)) and to think about other important elements that I may miss such as the mechanics of the game and how they player will interact in the world I would have written.

I try to meticulously sculpt player actions, gameplay reactions, and the game’s aesthetic feel. This trinity ensures players not only hear the story but live it, leaving an indelible mark on their gaming memories (at least, that is my hope) and draw.io plays a crucial part in visualizing this balance and I do this by means of The Beat sheet.

The Beat sheet – it contains the plot structure, a timeline and player mechanics described throughout the journey.

The Beat sheet, one of my favourite aspects of game development in narrative design. This tool allows me to sift through the plot, retaining what works while considering the essential mechanics for the intended experience. What I employ is a simplified version of a beat sheet tailored for short game development. Here’s a breakdown:

• Story Beat: A brief snapshot of the story at a specific moment.
• Game Objective: The goal set for the player during that scene or moment.
• Action: The player’s anticipated activity.
• Cutscene: Primarily used for exposition or transitions. Sometimes, players have no control during these segments. Their purpose is to seamlessly transition from one scene to another, such as guiding the player’s journey from one part of the world to another.

Andy Outro

Refining your story plot and mastering your game mechanics is an iterative process that will take a few tries, to get the final version to place you are happy with.

In the last blogpost, I’ll be looking at how draw.io has been instrumental for visualizing my storytelling journey.

draw.io Outro

To follow along with the rest of Andy’s storytelling in game design series, see:

1. From Chaos to Clarity: Conceptualizing Your Short Game
2. Crafting Memorable Characters: From Chaos to Clarity
3. Refining Story Plots and Mechanics for Your Short Game
4. Game Design’s Chaos Compass: draw.io

Introduction

In the universe of game development, characters are the heartbeat, the anchors that tether players to our fantastical realms.

My focus will be my main character Adelaide. This being a short game I want to make sure the main character has had more time spent being defined with background, traits, quirks. Players will be spending most of their time immersed with her in the game.

Other characters will have enough detail to bolster our heroine and have their own personalities.

Chaos in Character Creation

In exploring this chaotic phase, where rough sketches, quirky traits, and unique backstories emerge. I try to keep track of this whirlwind of creativity, I will turn to my trusty companion, draw.io, and utilize this tool to help me store, organize, and breathe life into these initial character ideas.

Chaotic Character Creation is a whirlwind ride of ideas of its own, with its own sketches and concepts. They will be characters ready for their adventures.

Rough word cloud for the player character, the villain and ancillary/secondary characters

Character Refinement

When the brainstorming storm subsides, I am left with a room (or brain) full of scribbles. Refining these rough diamonds will shape more of the story and game and how it all plays out as an experience of adventure for the player.

For the character crafting journey, draw.io has been invaluable, turning abstract ideas into clear character maps, and personas, seeing the connected relationships and where they will take the story.

Character details for the main player character

Character details of the villain

Lastly the ancillary/secondary characters that support either villain or player character (our heroine)

You may have noticed reader that the details diminish for each character after our main heroine. That was by choice: at the end of the day the relationships and connections all serve a purpose to drive the story forward, and if you decide that it is your villain or even a minor character that will have more details, if it helps to convey an immersive and compelling story, then great! (and if you do, let me know! I would love to read it/experience it!)

Andy Outro

We have our initial story concept, and we have begun developing the characters. In the next blogpost, we’ll start weaving the threads together, to refine the story plot, and working within a Mechanics, Dynamics, and Aesthetics (MDA) framework to start to map out what the characters will do in the game.

draw.io Outro

To follow along with the rest of Andy’s storytelling in game design series, see:

1. From Chaos to Clarity: Conceptualizing Your Short Game
2. Crafting Memorable Characters: From Chaos to Clarity
3. Refining Story Plots and Mechanics for Your Short Game
4. Game Design’s Chaos Compass: draw.io

Introduction

In my approach to game design, creativity flows like a torrential river. It surges with unbridled energy, carving new pathways as it rushes ahead. This river is the lifeblood of our craft, birthing innovative ideas and ground-breaking experiences. But, like any mighty river, it can be wild, unpredictable, and chaotic. 

Emphasizing the Creative Chaos

This is a journey that most game designers know well and if you didn’t, spoiler alert, it’s chaotic! We celebrate the chaos of game ideation, where ideas bubble up like geysers and concepts collide like celestial bodies. This chaotic phase is where the magic begins, but it’s also where things can get, well, a bit messy.

Here is where draw.io enters stage right, I start with a file called Untitled Diagram.drawio

Last thing on my mind is a file name until something takes shape later on.

The Importance of Structure

Chaos can fuel the creative spark, structure can serve as the guiding hand to shape raw ideas into tangible forms. As a game designer, I must embrace both sides of this creative coin. I will emphasize the importance of structure and a well-organized approach in game ideation as a counterbalance to the beginning of the chaos.

Embracing the Chaos

The Initial Stages

The brainstorming stage. Here, there are no rules, no judgments, only a canvas waiting to be painted with the wildest of ideas. Start at the end, start with a lowly character, or even a colour or anything that comes to mind, it’s a time for creativity to run free, unburdened, undisciplined and unplanned.

I can start with an object or a character and grow from there, whether it is a haunted mug of mouldy coffee (ew! Don’t think of the smell! Or do?), the protagonist, villain or even a minion.

I started with an overall concept based on an article I read about a theoretical supercontinent of Earth called Ur from 3.5 billion years ago for this journey.

Using Visual Representations

Visual representation is key to my process. At the beginning there are notes; words, phrases, illustrations that have no logical flow… Yet! But right then and there I don’t care (Yet!) all these moments of frenetic writing, one idea after the next and disjointed as they may be, I use diagrams, cells, blocks, or formless texts (text without borders/margins or in a cell) in an open draw.io diagram and start creating a cloud of random cells and a vague story with all the aforementioned notes (sometimes I’ll add lemon or soap forgetting it is not a shopping list but it doesn’t matter!)

A word cloud centred around a story prompt, concept or idea.

Benefits of Free-Flowing Brainstorm

But why embrace chaos at all? The answer lies in its unpredictability. It’s in this chaos that I find unexpected gems—ideas we might have missed in the more structured approach. The free-flowing brainstorm opens doors to innovation, pushing me to think outside of the box and more to the “what-ifs” (what if my character did this, what if we explored that, what if I bought lime instead?) pushing beyond my creative boundaries and habits.

In the chaos I begin to see patterns begin to form, something tangible, hidden gems, and potential for an idea to become something greater than the sum of all its disjointed parts.

It’s a process that always helps me to grow creatively and imaginatively.

Organizing the Chaos

Transitioning to Order

Yet, like a chef with all sorts of ingredients (I really need to finish my shopping list), there comes a time when we must transition from chaos to order. This transition is where the magic truly happens, as ideas find their place in the grand kitchen of game design.

Before was where the fun began, and here is where the magic can be realised, where we put all or most of the pieces together. The transition where ideas find their place.

Structured Concepts

Exploring how to structure those initial, wild ideas into a coherent game concept. We introduce the concept of order without stifling creativity, a delicate dance of structure and freedom.

Now, it’s all about giving structure to those brilliant, if not slightly mad, brainwaves of mine, yours, ours, without squashing the creative spark of course!

At the time I use what’s called an affinity diagram, this diagram brings ideas together into their natural relationships, things that seem to make sense grouped together.

A type of affinity diagram, categorizing ideas that seem to flow together or relate to each other.

draw.io: My Creative Ally

Throughout these steps, draw.io has been my toolset for this journey, from an untitled file to put all my disjointed ideas like a notepad, to a now-named file called “Tablet of Ur.drawio”. The seas have become calmer now as the game ideas have been taken from chaos to a rough shape.

At this point I have made a very rough outline of the game with timeline of the story and characters – it is rough and incomplete, but I can see that there is something there taking shape.

Refined the core story, added basic ideas to characters, gameplay, aesthetics and events in the form of a timeline.

Andy Outro

Once you have started to organise your ideas into a cohesive brainstorm, it’s time to focus on who will star in this story.

Join me in my next blogpost where I delve into the realm of character development, and show you how to craft unforgettable characters who will be carefully woven into your story.

draw.io Outro

We’ll be following Andy’s story in the following weeks, covering the following topics:

1. From Chaos to Clarity: Conceptualizing Your Short Game
2. Crafting Memorable Characters: From Chaos to Clarity
3. Refining Story Plots and Mechanics for Your Short Game
4. Game Design’s Chaos Compass: draw.io

Upside down, round and round…

When you’re a seasoned member of staff sauntering (or more likely speed-walking) through the endless corridors and departments, and hopping between floors, it’s easy to forget where you once started: trying to find a particular ward, or the right floor – hospitals are a complex maze when you’re just starting out.

Knowing whom to go to for what is an equal challenge, as hospitals have a myriad of staff with individual and overlapping responsibilities.

However, a well-designed floor plan, paired with an extensive org chart, will save your new staff a lot of time (and pain) of arriving at the wrong place, or bothering the wrong team with information for someone else.

The good news is draw.io can help you design floor plans from the ground up, and org charts from the central teams outward. The key with both is not to deliver all the information in one complex, messy diagram, but rather to start off simple, and then add layers of complexity gradually.

We’ll show you how you can use draw.io features like layers and custom links to give both a brief overview and signpost to the finer details, all within a single diagram.

Floor plans

To get started with your own floor plan, download our XML template here:

1. Open Confluence.
2. Open draw.io (blank diagram).
3. Drag & drop your XML file into your blank drawing area.
4. Use it as a custom template if you like.

This floor plan template uses layers so anyone accessing the diagram can choose to show and hide different layers, depending on the level of detail they would like to view.

For more information on features like clickable actions and custom links for your hospital floor plan, see our blogpost, Interactive diagrams with custom links and actions.

In addition to providing basic information about the physical layout of a hospital, floor plans can also be used to convey important safety information. For example, they might show the location of emergency exits, fire extinguishers, and other safety equipment.

A wide range of floor plan symbols can be found by going to + More Shapes > Other > Floorplans.

Org charts

To get started with your own circular org chart (aka peach diagram), download our XML template here:

1. Open Confluence.
2. Open draw.io (blank diagram).
3. Drag & drop your XML file into your blank drawing area.
4. Use it as a custom template if you like.

An org chart provides a clear overview of a hospital’s hierarchy, showing the relationships between different departments and individuals. This is helpful for understanding who is responsible for what, and who to go to for specific questions or concerns.

With draw.io, you can add metadata to individual shapes, so that if someone hovers over a team name for example, they will see a brief description of what that team does.

Like with our floor plan example, you are able to add custom links, for example to Confluence pages that contain more detailed information on a particular team, its members and their responsibilities.

For more information on how to structure your org chart, see the blogpost, How to build a circular organizational chart in draw.io.

Getting settled in

Your floor plans and org charts will provide new starters with key information in a digestible way, which they can customize to suit their needs in the preview version, i.e. without editing the original version.

This information is a staple in any hospital. It informs new staff of what’s what, helping them feel comfortable and confident to navigate their way as they settle in.

Want to dive deeper into the world of draw.io? Access our linktr.ee page to follow us on social media and learn how others use draw.io, as well as pick up some helpful tips and tricks.

Driving positive change

For administrators, improvement teams, and medical professionals in general, identifying an improvement goal and all the factors that will positively influence this outcome is crucial for improving systems already in place.

These systems can be on a micro level, such as changing a specific medical process or proposing change within one organization, or on a macro level, e.g. effectuating change in a number of organizations across regions or even countries. Whether you’re working on changing a micro-level or macro-level system, it’s key to understand how the components within the system depend on and influence each other.

Whatever change you are looking to influence, you want to implement specific strategies to achieve the goal set. Driver diagrams are the established method to define your system and visualize the change process. They achieve this by highlighting the causal relationships that influence the goal.

Working with driver diagrams

Driver diagrams consist of the following:

• The goal i.e. the outcome you are looking to achieve. This goal is driven by:

• • Primary drivers: a small number of factors that you believe will cause the outcome to occur.
  • Secondary drivers: even smaller factors that influence the primary drivers.
  • Change ideas: the projects or activities to put in place that will contribute to the primary and secondary drivers, and will result in improving the system overall.

These are the fundamental steps, but further layers can be added to the process where necessary, e.g. tertiary drivers, depending on the complexity of the system.

1. Open Confluence.
2. Open draw.io (blank diagram).
3. Drag & drop your XML file into your blank drawing area.
4. Use it as a custom template if you like.

The process

Start with your “why” and set your goal

Make sure the goal is something that is well-defined, measurable, and most importantly: realistic.

For example, “To improve the efficiency of healthcare provision at [organization]”, is too broad and would need to be narrowed down. Setting a SMART goal can help with this. Applying SMART criteria, we could rewrite our goal as, “To reduce the average waiting time in [department] at [organization] to [x] weeks by [date].”

Having a more specific goal allows us to benchmark against the current average waiting time. It also means that by the deadline we have set, we can see if the measures we’ve put in place have positively contributed to achieving, or being closer to achieving, our average waiting time goal.

Once your goal is set, it’s time to think about the drivers that will influence this.

Consider the potential drivers

What needs to be improved, in order to achieve this goal?

Continuing with the above scenario, primary drivers might include: patient bookings; appointment availability, and the hiring process. Drawing on these themes, secondary drivers might be: improve the booking appointment system, increase the size of the department, and so on.

To keep everything in one place, you can add a new page to your driver diagram to capture your and your team’s ideas for a list of potential drivers. That way, anyone accessing the driver diagram can see the outcome of the original brainstorming process and how the drivers were selected:

Once you’ve mapped out all of your drivers, see if there are any commonalities where you can group ideas together into a single driver. Like with the goal, you want drivers to be well-defined, and ideally measurable.

Think about your change ideas

Change ideas can be activities or projects. These are the actions that will drive the change you want to see, and that you believe will contribute to reaching the goal.

With the driver, “improve the booking appointment system” for example, a change idea could be “centralize the booking system”. While this change idea will need to be broken down further to specify who is going to centralize the system, how, and by what date, this is a concrete activity that will influence the corresponding driver.

Visualize your driver diagram

You are now ready to add your drivers and change ideas to your driver diagram, along with the links between the different sections.

By allocating primary, secondary, and even tertiary drivers in your diagram, you will gain a clearer view of which actions to prioritize that will most likely help you achieve your goal.

Helpful tips when customizing your connectors

The following features are useful when customizing the connectors in your driver diagram:

Choose between dashed and solid connectors

Solid connectors indicate a strong relationship between components, whereas dashed connectors indicate a weaker relationship.

To change a connector line type, click on the connector, or hold down Ctrl (Windows) or Cmd (Mac) to select multiple connectors, click on the Pattern option, and choose the line type you wish to use.

Change the connector endpoints

Driver diagrams can be read from right to left, from “cause”, (the change ideas and drivers), to “effect”, (the goal or aim). The connectors between the goal and drivers often, (but not always), have arrowheads indicating this right-to-left direction of cause and effect: the secondary drivers feed into the primary drivers, and the primary drivers feed into the overarching goal.

If you want to remove all the endpoints in one go:

1. Select all connectors by either:
   1. right-clicking on any blank space in the editor and click on Select Edges, or
   2. pressing Ctrl+Shift+E (Windows) or Cmd+Shift+E (Mac);
2. then click on the Line End option, and choose None from the top of the dropdown menu.

Change the waypoints

If instead of diagonal straight lines between the connections, you prefer orthogonal (great word, right?) aka right-angled lines between concepts: select all connectors using Ctrl or Cmd+Shift+E, head to Waypoints, and select the second option from the dropdown menu.

Customize your connection points

Customizing your connection points gives you complete flexibility: you can add connection points anywhere you want to on a given shape for your connectors to attach to. This also tidies up your diagram by evenly distributing your connectors going to and from a particular shape, depending on how many connection points you need for each side.

To change the connection points:

1. Right-click on a shape and select Edit Connection Points…

2. In the edit connection points modal you can then choose to delete each connection point individually, or delete them in bulk:

   1. To delete an individual connection point, click on the point, then click on the trashcan icon.

   2. To delete multiple default connection points, click and drag your mouse over some or all of the connection points, and then click on the trashcan icon.

3. In the number field, type in how many connection points you want for a side of the shape, and click Add, to apply the changes. Repeat this step for each side of the shape you want connection points for.

4. Once you are done, click Apply. You can then drag your connector endpoints to your custom shape connectors.

Be in the driver’s seat

Want to “drive” deeper into the world of draw.io? Access our linktr.ee page to follow us on social media and learn how others use draw.io, as well as pick up some helpful tips and tricks.

Connections hold together what belongs together. Connections show sequences, or draw your attention to essential steps in a given process. But even more importantly, they can also save you time. For example:

“You meet the person of your dreams. You gather all your courage and want to talk to them. At the last moment, you check their hands. Left hand, ring finger… there is already a 1:1 relationship – damn it!”

So, a ring in a specific location can instantly tell a complete story in the background. What ends unhappily for the protagonist in our little example has immense value in the business world. Relationships here are not just 1:1; they are multilayered. For this reason, norms have been created to reflect this multilayeredness and enable associative entities.

In this blogpost, we deal with formatting using different connection endpoints in draw.io. If you are interested in the topic of connectors in general, we recommend our YouTube Connectors Playlist, which contains many helpful tips and tricks.

The default connection in draw.io is the classic arrow; there is no symbol indicating the line start, and an arrowhead to designate the line end. However, you can change this via the Format panel and the Style tab to create your own individual, expressive connectors with just two mouse clicks. Remember to save the connection in your scratchpad or even create a custom library, so that you and your colleagues can benefit from your preliminary work.

You can change further settings via the same menu. For example, depending on the diagram, it can be very useful to increase the size of the line start and end, to emphasize these.

But of course, that’s not all. There are specific connectors that are used according to international standards. So why build your own connectors, when draw.io already has them at hand? Many libraries in draw.io already offer predefined connectors. You can find examples in our General library, which can save you a lot of time. Equally, you can use our Shape Search to find specific associations.

When creating diagrams adhering to standards such as BPMN 2.0, you will find all the elements you need in the corresponding library. To locate these, head to +More Shapes in the diagram editor, or the + icon in the board editor, each located at the bottom of the left sidebar.

Locating the BPMN 2.0 shape library in the draw.io diagram editor

Locating the BPMN 2.0 shape library in the draw.io board editor

Want to dive deeper into the world of draw.io? Access our linktr.ee page to follow us on social media and learn how others use draw.io, as well as pick up some helpful tips and tricks.

Keep everything peachy keen

We’ve all seen the traditional hierarchical organizational (org) chart with the bigwigs at the top, and the different role levels with decreasing responsibilities below. Frankly, this type of chart isn’t always the most inspiring.

In addition, many modern and Agile organizations don’t work within such a rigid framework – there are nuanced interrelations between the various teams and roles.

In this blogpost, we’ll be looking at an alternative to the traditional organizational chart – the “peach diagram”, or circular org chart.

Out with the old, in with the new

Peach diagrams are an important way to visualize a company structure in a way that goes against the grain of the traditional org chart. The core teams are in the center of the circle, and the outer layers include teams that revolve around this central hub.

Rather than information flowing downwards, information flows in and out of concentric circles. The circle layers highlight the bidirectional interrelation between teams, which better showcases the collaborative aspect of cross-team communication and that teams are on equal footing, compared to the traditional organizational structure. This type of diagram also better captures company structures where there is regular involvement between the company and venture or external partners.

Getting to the core: how to create a peach diagram

Before creating the diagram, you first need to know your structure:

• Who is in the core: this often includes teams like HR, strategy, and finance.
• Which teams are in the outer circles and where: this depends on the individual organization. Often, teams like legal, data compliance, IT support, and so on, tend to be situated close to the inner circle, whereas those that have more interaction with external partners tend to be situated toward the edges of the structure.

To get started with your own peach diagram, download our XML template here:

1. Open Confluence.
2. Open draw.io (blank diagram).
3. Drag & drop your XML file into your blank drawing area.
4. Use it as a custom template if you like.

Tips

Add metadata to your shapes

If you want to add some explanatory text to a shape, for example to describe the function of a particular team, you can do this by right-clicking a shape, selecting Edit Data, and typing in what you want to display when someone hovers over the shape.

Add links to your shapes

Alternatively, you can add custom links to shapes. For example, when a colleague clicks on a particular team’s name, it takes them to a Confluence page where they can find out more information about the specific team or a related process.

Simply right-click on the shape, select Edit Link, and drag and drop or paste the link into the first field.

Regardless of which organizational structure you use, the information can quickly become out of date. While anyone with editing rights can see when the diagram was last updated in the diagram’s revision history, it is helpful to also include a timestamp of when the diagram was last updated somewhere in your diagram. This ensures anyone across your organization accessing the diagram instantly knows how recent the information they’re consulting is.

Want to dive deeper into the world of draw.io? Access our linktr.ee page to follow us on social media and learn how others use draw.io, as well as pick up some helpful tips and tricks.